Chapter 17

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_ CHAPTER XVII

"'Twas not without some reason, for the wind
Increased at night, until it blew a gale;
And though 'twas not much to a naval mind,
Some landsmen would have look'd a little pale,
For sailors are, in fact, a different kind;
At sunset they began to take in sail,
For the sky show'd it would come on to blow,
And carry away, perhaps, a mast or so."

BYRON.

As it was just past the turn of the day, Bluewater determined to linger on the cliffs for several hours, or until it was time to think of his dinner. Abstracted as his thoughts were habitually, his mind found occupation and pleasure in witnessing the evolutions that succeeded among the ships; some of which evolutions it may be well now briefly to relate.

Sir Gervaise Oakes' foot had not been on the deck of the Plantagenet five minutes, before a signal for all commanders was flying at that vessel's mast-head. In ten minutes more every captain of the fleet, with the exception of those belonging to the vessels in the offing, were in the flag-ship's cabin, listening to the intentions and instructions of the vice-admiral.

"My plan of sailing, gentlemen, is easily comprehended," continued the commander-in-chief, after he had explained his general intentions to chase and engage; "and everyone of you will implicitly follow it. We have the tide strong at ebb, and a good six-knot breeze is coming up at south-west. I shall weigh, with my yards square, and keep them so, until the ship has drawn out of the fleet, and then I shall luff up on a taut bowline and on the starboard tack, bringing the ebb well under my lee-bow. This will hawse the ship over towards Morlaix, and bringing us quite as far to windward as is desirable. While the ebb lasts, and this breeze stands, we shall have plain sailing; the difficulty will come on the flood, or with a shift of wind. The ships that come out last must be careful to keep their seconds, ahead and astern, in plain sight, and regulate their movements, as much as they can, by the leading vessels. The object is to spread as wide a clew as possible, while we hold the ships within signal-distance of each other. Towards sunset I shall shorten sail, and the line will close up within a league from vessel to vessel, and I have told Bluewater to use his discretion about coming out with the last ships, though I have requested him to hold on as long as he shall deem it prudent, in the hope of receiving another express from the Admiralty. When the flood makes, I do not intend to go about, but shall continue on the starboard tack, and I wish you all to do the same. This will bring the leading vessels considerably to windward of those astern, and may possibly throw the fleet into a bow and quarter line. Being in the van, it will fall to my duty to look to this, and to watch for the consequences. But I ask of you to keep an eye on the weather, and to hold your ships within plain signal-distance of each other. If it come on thick, or to blow very hard, we must close, from van to rear, and try our luck, in a search in compact order. Let the man who first sees the enemy make himself heard at once, and send the news, with the bearings of the French, both ahead and astern, as fast as possible. In that case you will all close on the point from which the intelligence comes; and, mark me, no cruising to get to windward, in your own fashions, as if you sailed with roving commissions. You know I'll not stand _that_. And now, gentlemen, it is probable that we shall all never meet again. God bless you! Come and shake hands with me, one by one, and then to your boats, for the first lieutenant has just sent Greenly word that we are up and down. Let him trip, Greenly, and be off as soon as we can."

The leave-taking, a scene in which joyousness and sadness were strangely mingled, succeeded, and then the captains disappeared. From that moment every mind was bent on sailing.

Although Bluewater did not witness the scene in the Plantagenet's cabin, he pictured it, in his mind's eye, and remained on the cliffs to watch the succeeding movements. As Wycherly had disappeared in the house, and Dutton clung to his flag-staff, the rear-admiral had no one but Lord Geoffrey for a companion. The latter, perceiving that his relation did not seem disposed to converse, had the tact to be silent himself; a task that was less difficult than common, on account of the interest he felt in the spectacle.

The boats of the different captains were still shoving off from the starboard side of the Plantagenet, whither etiquette had brought them together, in a little crowd, when her three top-sails fell, and their sheets steadily drew the clews towards the ends of the lower yards. Even while this was in process, the yards began to ascend, and rose with that steady but graduated movement which marks the operation in a man-of-war. All three were fairly mast-headed in two minutes. As the wind struck the canvass obliquely, the sails filled as they opened their folds, and, by the time their surfaces were flattened by distension, the Plantagenet steadily moved from her late berth, advancing slowly against a strong tide, out of the group of ships, among which she had been anchored. This was a beautiful evolution, resembling that of a sea-fowl, which lazily rises on its element, spreads its wings, emerges from the water, and glides away to some distant and unseen point.

The movement of the flag-ship was stately, measured, and grand. For five minutes she held her way nearly due east, with the wind on her starboard quarter, meeting the tide in a direct line; until, having drawn sufficiently ahead of the fleet, she let fall her courses, sheeted home top-gallant-sails and royals, set her spanker, jibs, and stay-sails, and braced up sharp on a wind, with her head at south-southeast. This brought the tide well under her lee fore-chains, and set her rapidly off the land, and to windward. As she trimmed her sails, and steadied her bowlines, she fired a gun, made the numbers of the vessels in the offing to weigh, and to pass within hail. All this did Bluewater note, with the attention of an _amateur_, as well as with the critical analysis of a _connoisseur_.

"Very handsomely done, Master Geoffrey--very handsomely done, it must be allowed! never did a bird quit a flock with less fuss, or more beautifully, than the Plantagenet has drawn out of the fleet. It must be admitted that Greenly knows how to handle his ship."

"I fancy Captain Stowel would have done quite as well with the Caesar, sir," answered the boy, with a proper esprit-de-_ship_. "Don't you remember, Admiral Bluewater, the time when we got under way off l'Orient, with the wind blowing a gale directly on shore? Even Sir Gervaise said, afterwards, that we lost less ground than any ship in the fleet, and yet the Plantagenet is the most weatherly two-decker in the navy; as every body says."

"Every body!--She is certainly a weatherly vessel, but not more so than several others. Whom did you ever hear give that character to this particular ship?"

"Why, sir, her reefers are always bragging as much as _that_; and a great deal _more_, too."

"Her reefers!--Young gentlemen are particularly struck with the charms of their first loves, both ashore and afloat, my boy. Did you ever hear an _old seaman_ say that much for the Plantagenet?"

"I think I have, sir," returned Lord Geoffrey, blushing. "Galleygo, Sir Gervaise's steward, is commonly repeating some such stuff or other. They are furious braggarts, the Plantagenet's, all round, sir."

"That comes honestly," answered Bluewater, smiling, "her namesakes and predecessors of old, having some such characteristic, too. Look at that ship's yards, boy, and learn how to trim a vessel's sails on a wind. The pencil of a painter could not draw lines more accurate!"

"Captain Stowel tells us, sir, that the yards ought not to be braced in exactly alike; but that we ought to check the weather-braces, a little, as we go aloft, so that the top-sail yard should point a little less forward than the lower yard, and the topgallant than the top-sail."

"You are quite right in taking Stowel's opinion in all such matters, Geoffrey: but has not Captain Greenly done the same thing in the Plantagenet? When I speak of symmetry, I mean the symmetry of a seaman."

The boy was silenced, though exceedingly reluctant to admit that any ship could equal his own. In the mean time, there was every appearance of a change in the weather. Just about the time the Plantagenet braced up, the wind freshened, and in ten minutes it blew a stiff breeze. Some time before the admiral spoke the vessels outside, he was compelled to take in all his light canvass; and when he filled, again, after giving his orders to the frigate and sloop, the topgallant sheets were let fly, a single reef was taken in the top-sails, and the lighter sails were set over them. This change in the weather, more especially as the night threatened to be clouded, if not absolutely dark, would necessarily bring about a corresponding change in the plan of sailing, reducing the intervals between the departures of the vessels, quite one-half. To such vicissitudes are all maritime operations liable, and it is fortunate when there is sufficient capacity in the leaders to remedy them.

In less than an hour, the Plantagenet's hull began to sink, to those on a level with it, when the Carnatic tripped her anchor, opened her canvass, shot out of the fleet, hauled by the wind, and followed in the admiral's wake. So accurate was the course she steered, that, half an hour after she had braced up, a hawse-bucket, which had been dropped from the Plantagenet in hauling water, was picked up. We may add, here, though it will be a little anticipating events, that the Thunderer followed the Carnatic; the Blenheim the Thunderer; the Achilles the Blenheim; the Warspite the Achilles; the Dover the Warspite; the York the Dover; the Elizabeth the York; the Dublin the Elizabeth; and the Caesar the Dublin. But hours passed before all these ships were in motion, and hours in which we shall have some occurrences to relate that took place on shore. Still it will aid the reader in better understanding the future incidents of our tale, if we describe, at once, some of the circumstances under which all these ships got in motion.

By the time the Plantagenet's top-sails were beginning to dip from the cliffs, the Carnatic, the Thunderer, the Blenheim, the Achilles, and the Warspite were all stretching out in line, with intervals of quite two leagues between them, under as much canvass as they could now bear. The admiral had shortened sail the most, and was evidently allowing the Carnatic to close, most probably on account of the threatening look of the sky, to windward; while he was suffering the frigate and sloop, the Chloe and Driver, to pass ahead of him, the one on his weather, and the other on his lee bow. When the Dover weighed, the admiral's upper sail was not visible from her tops, though the Warspite's hull had not yet disappeared from her deck. She left the fleet, or the portions of it that still remained at anchor, with her fore-course set, and hauled by the wind, under double-reefed top-sails, a single reef in her main-sail, and with her main-topgallant sail set over its proper sail. With this reduced canvass, she started away on the track of her consorts, the brine foaming under her bows, and with a heel that denoted the heavy pressure that bore on her sails. By this time, the York was aweigh, the tide had turned, and it became necessary to fill on the other tack in order to clear the land to the eastward. This altered the formation, but we will now revert to the events as they transpired on the shore, with a view to relate them more in their regular order.

It is scarcely necessary to say that Bluewater must have remained on, or about the cliffs several hours, in order to witness the departure of so many of the vessels. Instead of returning to the Hall at the dinner hour, agreeably to promise, he profited by the appearance of Wycherly, who left the cottage with a flushed, agitated manner, just as he was thinking of the necessity of sending a message to Sir Reginald, and begged the young man to be the bearer of his excuses. He thought that the change in the weather rendered it necessary for him to remain in sight of the sea. Dutton overheard this message, and, after a private conference with his wife, he ventured to invite his superior to appease his appetite under his own humble roof. To this Bluewater cheerfully assented; and when the summons came to the table, to his great joy he found that his only companion was to be Mildred, who, like himself, for some reason known only to her own bosom, had let the ordinary dining hour pass without appearing at table, but whom her mother had now directed to take some sustenance.

"The late events at the Hall have agitated the poor child, sir," said Mrs. Dutton, in the way of apology, "and she has not tasted food since morning. I have told her you would excuse the intrusion, and receive her carving and attentions as an excuse for her company."

Bluewater looked at the pallid countenance of the girl, and never before had he found the resemblance to Agnes Hedworth so strong, as that moment. The last year or two of his own sweet friend's life had been far from happy, and the languid look and tearful eyes of Mildred revived the recollection of the dead with painful distinctness.

"Good God!" he murmured to himself; "that two such beings should exist only to suffer! my good Mrs. Dutton, make no excuses; but believe me when I say that you could not have found in England another that would have proved as welcome as my present little messmate."

Mildred struggled for a smile; and she did succeed in looking extremely grateful. Beyond this, however, it exceeded her powers to go. Mrs. Dutton was gratified, and soon left the two to partake of their neat, but simple meal, by themselves; household duties requiring her presence elsewhere.

"Let me persuade you to take a glass of this really excellent port, my child," said Bluewater. "If you had cruised as long as I have done, on the coast of Portugal, you would know how to value a liquor as pure as this. I don't know of an admiral that has as good!"

"It is probably _our_ last, sir," answered Mildred, shaking a tear from each of her long dark lashes, by an involuntarily trembling motion, as she spoke. "It was a present from dear, old, Sir Wycherly, who never left my mother wholly unsupplied with such plain delicacies, as he fancied poverty placed beyond our reach. The wine we can easily forget; not so easily the donor."

Bluewater felt as if he could draw a cheque for one-half the fortune he had devised to his companion; and, yet, by a caprice of feeling that is not uncommon to persons of the liveliest susceptibility, he answered in a way to smother his own emotion.

"There will not soon be another _old_ Sir Wycherly to make his neighbours comfortable; but there is a _young_ one, who is not likely to forget his uncle's good example. I hope you all here, rejoice at the sudden rise in fortune, that has so unexpectedly been placed within the reach of our favourite lieutenant?"

A look of anguish passed over Mildred's face, and her companion noted it; though surprise and pity--not to say resentment--prevented his betraying his discovery.

"We _endeavour_ to be glad, sir," answered Mildred, smiling in so suffering a manner, as to awaken all her companion's sympathies; "but it is not easy for us to rejoice at any thing which is gained by the loss of our former valued friend."

"I am aware that a young follow, like the present Sir Wycherly, can be no substitute for an old fellow like the last Sir Wycherly, my dear; but as one is a sailor, and the other was only a landsman, my professional prejudices may not consider the disparity as great as it may possibly appear to be to your less partial judgment."

Bluewater thought the glance he received was imploring, and he instantly regretted that he had taken such means to divert his companion's sadness. Some consciousness of this regret probably passed through Mildred's mind, for she rallied her spirits, and made a partially successful effort to be a more agreeable companion.

"My father thinks, sir," she said, "that our late pleasant weather is about to desert us, and that it is likely to blow heavily before six-and-thirty hours are over."

"I am afraid Mr. Dutton will prove to be too accurate an almanac. The weather has a breeding look, and I expect a dirty night. Good or bad, we seamen must face it, and that, too, in the narrow seas, where gales of wind are no gales of Araby."

"Ah, sir, it is a terrible life to lead! By living on this cliff, I have learned to pity sailors."

"Perhaps, my child, you pity us when we are the most happy. Nine seamen in ten prefer a respectable gale to a flat calm. There are moments when the ocean is terrific; but, on the whole, it is capricious, rather than malignant. The night that is before us promises to be just such a one as Sir Gervaise Oakes delights in. He is never happier than when he hears a gale howling through the cordage of his ship."

"I have heard him spoken of as a very daring and self-relying commander. But _you_ cannot entertain such feelings, Admiral Bluewater; for to me you seem better fitted for a fireside, well filled with friends and relatives, than for the conflicts and hardships of the sea."

Mildred had no difficulty now in forcing a smile, for the sweet one she bestowed on the veteran almost tempted him to rise and fold her in his arms, as a parent would wrap a beloved daughter to his heart. Discretion, however, prevented a betrayal of feelings that might have been misinterpreted, and he answered in his original vein.

"I fear I am a wolf in sheep's clothing," he said; "while Oakes admits the happiness he feels in seeing his ship ploughing through a raging sea, in a dark night, he maintains that my rapture is sought in a hurricane. I do not plead guilty to the accusation, but I will allow there is a sort of fierce delight in participating, as it might be, in a wild strife of the elements. To me, my very nature seems changed at such moments, and I forget all that is mild and gentle. That comes of having lived so much estranged from your sex, my dear; desolate bachelor, as I am."

"Do you think sailors ought to marry?" asked Mildred, with a steadiness that surprised herself; for, while she put the question, consciousness brought the blood to her temples.

"I should be sorry to condemn a whole profession, and that one I so well love, to the hopeless misery of single life. There are miseries peculiar to the wedded lives of both soldiers and sailors; but are there not miseries peculiar to those who never separate? I have heard seamen say--men, too, who loved their wives and families--that they believed the extreme pleasure of meetings after long separations, the delights of hope, and the zest of excited feelings, have rendered their years of active service more replete with agreeable sensations, than the stagnant periods of peace. Never having been married myself, I can only speak on report."

"Ah! this may be so with _men_; but--surely--surely--_women_ never can feel thus!"

"I suppose, a sailor's daughter yourself, you know Jack's account of his wife's domestic creed! 'A good fire, a clean hearth, the children abed, and the husband at sea,' is supposed to be the climax of felicity."

"This may do for the sailor's jokes, Admiral Bluewater," answered Mildred, smiling; "but it will hardly ease a breaking heart. I fear from all I have heard this afternoon, and from the sudden sailing of the ships, that a great battle is at hand?"

"And why should you, a British officer's daughter, dread that? Have you so little faith in us, as to suppose a battle will necessarily bring defeat! I have seen much of my own profession, Miss Dutton, and trust I am in some small degree above the rhodomontade of the braggarts; but it is _not_ usual for us to meet the enemy, and to give those on shore reason to be ashamed of the English flag. It has never yet been my luck to meet a Frenchman who did not manifest a manly desire to do his country credit; and I have always felt that we must fight hard for him before we could get him; nor has the result ever disappointed me. Still, fortune, or skill, or _right_, is commonly of our side, and has given us the advantage in the end."

"And to which, sir, do you ascribe a success at sea, so very uniform?"

"As a Protestant, I ought to say to our _religion_; but, this my own knowledge of Protestant _vices_ rejects. Then to say _fortune_ would be an exceeding self-abasement--one, that between us, is not needed; and I believe I must impute it to skill. As plain seamen, I do believe we are more expert than most of our neighbours; though I am far from being positive we have any great advantage over them in tactics. If any, the Dutch are our equals."

"Notwithstanding, you are quite certain of success. It must be a great encouragement to enter into the fight with a strong confidence in victory! I suppose--that is, it seems to me--it is a matter of course, sir,--that our new Sir Wycherly will not be able to join in the battle, this time?"

Mildred spoke timidly, and she endeavoured to seem unconcerned; but Bluewater read her whole heart, and pitied the pain which she had inflicted on herself, in asking the question. It struck him, too, that a girl of his companion's delicacy and sensibility would not thus advert to the young man's movements at all, if the latter had done aught justly to awaken censure; and this conviction greatly relieved his mind as to the effect of sudden elevation on the handsome lieutenant. As it was necessary to answer, however, lest Mildred might detect his consciousness of her feelings, not a moment was lost before making a reply.

"It is not an easy matter to prevent a young, dashing sailor, like this Sir Wycherly Wychecombe, from doing his part in a general engagement, and that, too, of the character of the one to which we are looking forward," he said. "Oakes has left the matter in my hands; I suppose I shall have to grant the young man's request."

"He has then requested to be received in your ship?" asked Mildred, her hand shaking as she used the spoon it held.

"That of course. No one who wears the uniform could or would do less. It seems a ticklish moment for him to quit Wychecombe, too; where I fancy he will have a battle of his own to fight ere long; but professional feeling will overshadow all others, in young men. Among us seamen, it is said to be even stronger than love."

Mildred made no answer; but her pale cheek and quivering lips, evidences of feeling that her artlessness did not enable her to conceal, caused Bluewater again to regret the remark. With a view to restore the poor girl to her self-command, he changed the subject of conversation, which did not again advert to Wycherly. The remainder of the meal was consequently eaten in peace, the admiral manifesting to the last, however, the sudden and generous interest he had taken in the character and welfare of his companion. When they rose from table, Mildred joined her mother, and Bluewater walked out upon the cliffs again.

It was now evening, and the waste of water that lay stretched before the eye, though the softness of summer was shed upon it, had the wild and dreary aspect that the winds and waves lend to a view, as the light of day is about to abandon the ocean to the gloom of night. All this had no effect on Bluewater, however, who knew that two-decked ships, strongly manned, with their heavy canvass reduced, would make light work of worrying through hours of darkness that menaced no more than these. Still the wind had freshened, and when he stood on the verge of the cliff sustained by the breeze, which pressed him back from the precipice, rendering his head more steady, and his footing sure, the Elizabeth was casting, under close-reefed top-sails, and two reefs in her courses, with a heavy stay-sail or two, to ease her helm. He saw that the ponderous machine would stagger under even this short canvass, and that her captain had made his dispositions for a windy night. The lights that the Dover and the York carried in their tops were just beginning to be visible in the gathering gloom, the last about a league and a half down channel, the ship standing in that direction to get to windward, and the former, more to the southward, the vessel having already tacked to follow the admiral. A chain of lights connected the whole of the long line, and placed the means of communication in the power of the captains. At this moment, the Plantagenet was full fifty miles at sea, ploughing through a heavy south-west swell, which the wind was driving into the chops of the channel, from the direction of the Bay of Biscay, and the broad Atlantic.

Bluewater buttoned his coat, and he felt his frame invigorated by a gale that came over his person, loaded by the peculiar flavour of the sea. But two of the heavy ships remained at their anchors, the Dublin and the Caesar; and his experienced eye could see that Stowel had every thing on board the latter ready to trip and be off, as soon as he, himself, should give the order. At this moment the midshipman, who had been absent for hours, returned, and stood again at his side.

"Our turn will soon come, sir," said the gallant boy, "and, for one, I shall not be sorry to be in motion. Those chaps on board the Plantagenet will swagger like so many Dons, if they should happen to get a broadside at Monsieur de Vervillin, while we are lying here, under the shore, like a gentleman's yacht hauled into a bay, that the ladies might eat without disturbing their stomachs."

"Little fear of that, Geoffrey. The Active is too light of foot, especially in the weather we have had, to suffer heavy ships to be so close on her heels. She must have had some fifteen or twenty miles the start, and the French have been compelled to double Cape la Hogue and Alderney, before they could even look this way. If coming down channel at all, they are fully fifty miles to the eastward; and should our van stretch far enough by morning to head them off, it will bring us handsomely to windward. Sir Gervaise never set a better trap, than he has done this very day. The Elizabeth has her hands full, boy, and the wind seems to be getting scant for her. If it knock her off much more, it will bring the flood on her weather-bow, and compel her to tack. This will throw the rear of our line into confusion!"

"What should we do, sir, in such a case? It would never answer to leave poor Sir Jarvy out there, by himself!"

"We would try not to do _that_!" returned Bluewater, smiling at the affectionate solicitude of the lad, a solicitude that caused him slightly to forget his habitual respect for the commander-in-chief, and to adopt the _sobriquet_ of the fleet. "In such a case, it would become my duty to collect as many ships as I could, and to make the best of our way towards the place where we might hope to fall in with the others, in the morning. There is little danger of losing each other, for any length of time, in these narrow waters, and I have few apprehensions of the French being far enough west, to fall in with our leading vessels before morning. If they _should_, indeed, Geoffrey--"

"Ay, sir, if they _should_, I know well enough what would come to pass!"

"What, boy?--On the supposition that Monsieur de Vervillin _did_ meet with Sir Gervaise by day-break, what, in your experienced eyes, seem most likely to be the consequences?"

"Why, sir, Sir Jarvy, would go at 'em, like a dolphin at a flying-fish; and if he _should_ really happen to catch one or two of 'em, there'll be no sailing in company with the Plantagenet's, for us Caesar's!--When we had the last 'bout with Monsieur de Gravelin, they were as saucy as peacocks, because we didn't close until their fore-yard and mizzen-top-gallant-mast were gone, although the shift of wind brought us dead to leeward, and, after all, we had eleven men the most hurt in the fight. You don't know them Plantagenet's, sir; for they never _dare_ say any thing before _you_!"

"Not to the discredit of my young Caesars, I'll answer for it. Yet, you'll remember Sir Gervaise gave us full credit, in his despatches."

"Yes, sir, all very true. Sir Gervaise knows better; and then _he_ understands what the Caesar _is_; and what she _can_ do, and _has_ done. But it's a very different matter with his youngsters, who fancy because they carry a red flag at the fore, they are so many Blakes and Howards, themselves. There's Jack Oldcastle, now; he's always talking of our reefers as if there was no sea-blood in our veins, and that just because his own father happened to be a captain--a _commodore_, he says, because he happened once to have three frigates under his orders."

"Well, that would make a commodore, for the time being. But, surely he does not claim privilege for the Oldcastle blood, over that of the Clevelands!"

"No, sir, it isn't that sort of thing, at all," returned the fine boy, blushing a little, in spite of his contempt for any such womanly weakness; "you know we never talk of that nonsense in our squadron. With us it's all service, and that sort of thing. Jack Oldcastle says the Clevelands are all civilians, as he calls 'em; or _soldiers_, which isn't much better, as you know, sir. Now, I tell him that there is an old picture of one of 'em, with an anchor-button, and that was long before Queen Anne's time--Queen Elizabeth's, perhaps,--and then you know, sir, I fetch him up with a yarn about the Hedworths; for I am just as much Hedworth as Cleveland."

"And what does the impudent dog say to that, Geoffrey?"

"Why, sir, he says the name should be spelt Head_work_, and that they were all _lawyers_. But I gave him as good as he sent for that saucy speech, I'm certain!"

"And what did you give him, in return for such a compliment? Did you tell him the Oldcastles were just so much stone, and wood, and old iron; and that, too, in a tumbledown condition?"

"No, sir, not I," answered the boy, laughing; "I didn't think of any answer half so clever; and so I just gave him a dig in the nose, and that, laid on with right good will."

"And how did he receive that argument? Was it conclusive;--or did the debate continue?"

"Oh, of course, sir, we fought it out. 'Twas on board the Dover, and the first lieutenant saw fair play. Jack carried too many guns for me, sir, for he's more than a year older; but I hulled him so often that he owned it was harder work than being mast-headed. After that the Dover's chaps took my part, and they said the Hedworths had no Head_work_ at all, but they were regular sailors; admirals, and captains, and youngsters, you know, sir, like all the rest of us. I told 'em my grandfather Hedworth was an admiral, and a good one, too."

"In that you made a small mistake. Your mother's father was only a _general_; but _his_ father was a full admiral of the red,--for he lived before that grade was abolished--and as good an officer as ever trod a plank. He was my mother's brother, and both Sir Gervaise and myself served long under his orders. He was a sailor of whom you well might boast."

"I don't think any of the Plantagenets will chase in that quarter again, sir; for we've had an overhauling among our chaps, and we find we can muster four admirals, two commodores, and thirteen captains in our two messes; that is, counting all sorts of relatives, you know, sir."

"Well, my dear boy, I hope you may live to reckon all that and more too, in your own persons, at some future day. Yonder is Sir Reginald Wychecombe, coming this way, to my surprise; perhaps he wishes to see me alone. Go down to the landing and ascertain if my barge is ashore, and let me know it, as soon as is convenient. Remember, Geoffrey, you will go off with me; and hunt up Sir Wycherly Wychecombe, who will lose his passage, unless ready the instant he is wanted."

The boy touched his cap, and went bounding down the hill to execute the order. _

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